Appeals court denies rehearing in ‘Blurred Lines’ case
US musicians Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams have been denied a rehearing in a copyright infringement case involving a Marvin Gaye song.
Yesterday, July 11, the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit refused the hearing and upheld the judgment that the song “Blurred Lines” infringes Gaye’s 1977 song “Got to Give it Up”.
The dispute began in 2013, when “Blurred Lines” was released. Following failed negotiations between the artists and Gaye’s family around the song’s alleged infringement, Williams, Thicke and rapper TI filed a case for a declaratory judgment of non-infringement.
Gaye’s family filed a counterclaim, alleging that “Blurred Lines” infringed their copyright.
In March 2015, the US District Court for the Central District of California ruled in favour of Gaye’s family and found that “Blurred Lines” infringes their copyright. His family was awarded $7.4 million in damages.
The district court rejected Williams’ and Thicke’s request for a retrial in 2015, although it did reduce the damages to $5.3 million.
Williams and Thicke filed an appeal in 2016. They argued that the copyright of the Gaye family and the song “Got to Give it Up” was limited only to sheet music and did not cover the audio. As a result, they said the copyright did not extend to sound recordings.
The artists enjoyed support from other musicians in their appeal. An amicus brief was filed on behalf of more than 200 musicians, including Fall Out Boy, Train, Linkin Park and R Kelly.
However, this appeal was unsuccessful and the Ninth Circuit upheld the $5.3 million award of damages.
In yesterday’s decision, the appeals court said that “Got to Give it Up” is subject to “broad” copyright protection. This is contrary to Williams’ and Thicke’s argument that the Gayes’ copyright only enjoys “thin” protection.
According to the court, “if there’s a wide range of expression, then copyright protection is ‘broad’ and a work will infringe if it’s substantially similar to the copyrighted work”.
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